At the outset, this blog will probably severely disappoint the nerds.

Don’t get me wrong, I love nerds. I’m just not one. I’m a huge Star Wars fan and I liked the recent Star Trek movies but have no desire to watch old episodes from different series of the TV show (unless I’m in a campy mood or need some cheap laughs).

The main question I’ll ask today is this: “Are Science and Religion at war with each other?”

The assumption is “Yes they are”, but is that assumption even correct? This is where both groups of people I am addressing get angry with me, and I’m sure I will probably be rightly criticized for spouting numbers today that I don’t really understand….again, I’m not a nerd and maybe only nerds really understand the numbers properly anyways…

For the person who believes that there is a loving God who created everything on purpose: Shouldn’t science back that up?

For the one who doesn’t: Are you afraid of a reading information that might make you question your belief?

That’s really my purpose today. Now, I’m not the guy who throws a wrench into what people belief to assert myself or just add to the general chaos that follows that sort of thing. I actually believe in something, and you can tell because I’m trying to build belief into people’s lives that actually translates into….what’s that thing the Bible says matters so much….Fruit! That’s how you judge a tree, not by its ideals. To point out all the things that aren’t working doesn’t really help if you can’t point out something that is and plan some practical steps towards it. I myself don’t respond well to those who just point the finger at me theoretically because the natural question coming back is “How’s your own life working for you?” Another topic for another day….

I did say “the Bible” and you may disagree with my belief that it was inspired by God for the human race. You may disagree that there’s a loving God altogether. I suppose if you’ve studied the Bible you couldn’t help but admit that it’s full of really amazing principles that would actually help those who actually applied it and I’m content if we start there. It also contains confusing things and I’d be the first to admit that too, though I don’t make the assumption behind it all that God is crazy or contradicts Himself, which a lot of people do and I get that. Again, there are those who don’t believe in God at all and tire of me making up the existence of God because I must be weak and need a crutch to get through life. Ironically another valid point that I would probably agree with you on.

I won’t even pretend to get into the science today. I wouldn’t understand it anyways but I would love to raise the question of the existence of God and its natural and far-reaching implications if He DID exist. I’ve been reading some material from the author Lee Strobel and was fascinated by his research especially in his book The Case For Christ. His background was that of a skeptic in every way and his response to his wife coming home one day and announcing she had become a follower of Jesus was what you would expect. Not the best news for an atheist and I can’t even imagine what was going on in his mind.

Lee set about on a two year journey to see if there was any truth that would point him towards the existence of God. I imagine his journey began to disprove it, but again he was not afraid of the science. After two years he stacked up the evidence for and against and realized it would take more faith to maintain his atheism than to become a Christian, so he became a Christ follower. I trust I have represented him well but you can read his material for yourself and keep me honest.

We spend a lot of time “navel-gazing” in our society. A friend of mine introduced me to this term and I had a good laugh and heartily agreed with her. We seem to have the luxury of thinking too much about ourselves and tend to get caught in a downward spiral of self-centredness which is never really that healthy.

How often do we look up?
It’s hard to see the wonder and grandeur of it all when we’re consumed with a ridiculously narrow perspective or, let’s be honest a limited (it pains me to say) intelligence or maybe more accurately…grasp on the big picture.

A book I was reading call Indescribable by Louie Giglio and Matt Redman pointed me in the right direction. The following facts were described in it and I hope I have relayed them accurately but in any case, buy the book and read them for yourself:)

The Sun
Described as an average star (meaning there are some smaller and some bigger).
Surface temperature: 27 Million degrees F.
Burns up 4 million tons of its own mass every second (and at this rate would still last another 5-6 billion years).
A jet flying at 500 mph from the surface of the sun to its core would take over a month.
To produce the same energy from the solar surface a hundred billion hydrogen bombs would have to explode every second in the star’s core.
It would take the gross national product of the US (I assume at the time Indescribable was written) for 7 million years for the local power company to run the sun for 1 second.

Distances
LA to New York? 2,462 miles.
Earth to the Moon? 240,000 miles.
Earth to the Sun? 93,000,000 miles.
One light year? 5.8 trillion miles.
Sun to the nearest star? 4.3 light years.
Width of the Milky Way? 100,000-120,000 light years.
To the Cf2A Great Wall? 200 million light years.
To the Sloan Great Wall? 1 billion light years.

DISCLAIMER: my head exploded when I started reading these numbers (and I trust I have relayed them accurately for someone who is not a nerd), and I looked up at the sky which I rarely do.

We get so lost in our tiny little worlds that are so important and all-consuming to us that we rarely look up at the wonder of it all. Whether you’re a WHAT person or a WHY person, I suspect we’d all be a little lost in the sauce with the sheer magnitude of the implications based solely on the size of the Universe we inhabit. The “What” person (just the facts ma’am) could never equate the reading of figures with the actual power required to create the things the figures were written about! Reading a book about war is different than surviving one. The “Why?” person doesn’t really care about WHAT anything is about if we can’t give them a reason or, more accurately a CAUSE behind it all.

And all roads lead to the big question: Is there a God?

Some look up and lose hope and come to the conclusion that there is no one coming to save them, but I don’t.

Granted I’m more of a why than a what person, but when I see the vastness and start asking the far-reaching questions I personally can come to no other conclusion than this: it was not an accident! Why our world was a car-wreck from what I believe was the beginning of the human race makes sense to me and I have faith for what I can’t see.

The funny thing is we all have faith for what we believe. Whether there is a God or not, you and I have had to take the final step into the unknown in the only arena that exists where the afterlife (if there is one) is concerned, the area of faith. Accurately: believing what we can’t see, unless you have some sort of weird camera into the next world that you’ve been keeping to yourself?

So what are you afraid of? If there is a God I would suggest one thing to you today….HE CAN BE FOUND! If my beliefs are correct, He wants to be found by us.

The sheer distances in the universe blow my mind, let alone the possibility of the distance between us and the God who made all this! I leave you with a possibility found in Scripture:

“He (God) didn’t deal with the problem (mankind’s separation from Himself) as something remote and unimportant. In his Son, Jesus, he personally took on the human condition, entered the disordered mess of struggling humanity in order to set it right once and for all.” Romans 8:3-4 Message Bible.

Thank God for that!